CBS 9/11 Documentary

Today's Offender: The American Family Association

The AFA is threatening to sicc the FCC on CBS for airing a 9/11 documentary during prime time (September 10th, 8:00-10:00pm) which contains profanity. The documentary has already been aired twice with no objections.

ACTION:

I used the AFA's boilerplate form letter (with a few key changes) to send the FCC a missive in support of CBS's airing of the 9/11 documetary in its entirety. I'm sure they will be quite surprised to receive an item from the AFA in support of airing the documentary.

Subject: In Support of Airing the 9/11 Documentary Intact

Dear FCC,

I ask that you support CBS's airing of the documentary "9/11" on September 10. I urge both you and CBS to stand strong and show the program with "reality intact."

The attitude of the American Family Association (AFA) seems to be that the airways belong to them, not to the people. They feel they should be able to impose their own subjective standard of decency onto the public whenever they desire. Congress has spoken on this issue under politically correct duress from groups like the AFA, afraid of losing their jobs during the next election cycle.

The Associated Press reports that the FCC has received "nearly 198,000" complaints about the documentary. The population of the United States is 281,421,906 (source: uscensus.gov). I do not think the FCC or CBS should be making programming decisions based on the opinions of fewer than 0.007% of the U.S. population.

The FCC and CBS should as a matter of principle override the AFA and air the documentary "as is," without concern about the threat of repercussions from the Christian Right. The AFA is merely a power-hungry, self-interested group that continually manipulates their elected representatives in the name of political correctness.

Sincerely,
Truthsmack
http://truthsmack.blogspot.com

ACTION:
I called WSPA (our local CBS affiliate) on Friday 9/8 to inquire about the program. The lady I spoke to in programming said that, as far as she knew, they planned to show the documentary in its entirety, sans bleeps. I thanked the station for taking a "brave and courageous" stand and showing the documentary as is.